duly rated by such means as these The Afflicted man is driven to call every Creature A lying Vanity and from hence he comes to call a Christ The Pearl of great Price It hath been said Vnto you that are Believers he is Precious we may add He is Precious to you that are Afflicted also The Afflicted man finds that Gold it self will do him no good whereupon a Saviour becomes more desirable than whole Mountains of Ophirs Gold unto him § The Lord resolves to make you know more Thirdly Of his WORD There is a Glorious Letter which the God of Heaven hath sent from the Third Heaven unto the Children of Men. Foolish man often throws it by like Wast-paper until Affliction puts him upon the due the diligent study of it David that had a lesser Bible than we could say in Psal. 119. 23. Princes did sit and speak against me but what was the issue of the Affliction which the Calumny and Obloquy of his Persecutors gave unto him It follows Thy Servant did Meditate on thy Statutes Bad weather in the World makes Afflicted men to keep their Eyes much upon the Light shining in a Dark place unto them To Meditate on a fit portion of the Bible dwelling on every Verse till at least one Observation and one Supplication be drawn from it hath not seldomer been the Ease than it hath been the Work of Afflicted Men And God will hereby help you as to a better Relish of so to a fuller Comment on these Miraculous Lines than once you had The bitter Tang of Afflictions will bring you to a better Taste of that Book whereof the Psalmist could say How sweet are thy words unto my Taste A Leaf of the Bible appears as to Luther not to be parted withall for all this whole World chiefly unto those whom Affliction hath convinced of the Vanity and Vexation here But this is not all the best Expositors of not a few Assertions in the Bible are some sore Afflictions in the World. The Stars and the Scriptures are seen best in a Frosty Night The Mysteries of a Well-ordered Covenant the Maeanders of a Deceitful Heart the worth and use of Great and Precious promises you will best understand in your Afflicted Hours Adversity makes a Verse of Scripture to be not like a Verse of Ovid as it often is to them that are not in Trouble as other men § The Lord resolves to make you know more Fourthly of YOUR SELVES The Golden Rule Know thy self is that which our God will have us Learn while we feel his Rod. A Wound will convince an Emperour that he is a Man. It was said unto Israel in Deut. 8. 2. The Lord Humbled them that what was in their Hearts might be known God will have us to see our own Follies and be Ashamed God will have us to see our own Graces and be Refreshed and in the Furnace of Affliction we must undergo a Fiery Tryal in order thereunto Scilicet ut Fulvum spectatur in Ignibus Aurum Under Affliction as God will bring you to say of your selves I have perverted that which is Right so he will find occasion for you to hear him saying to you Now I know that thou fearest me § But where shall I stop About the advancements of Sight procured by Affliction I may say as about the Instances of Faith it is said by the Apostle The time would fail me to mention them Yet let me briefly add By the Afflictions whereof you complain God will bring you to Know what SIN is You that formerly counted Stollen Waters are Sweet shall now see Sin in a truer uglier dress you shall see that it is as in Ier. 44. 4. The abominable thing which I hate saith the Lord. God will also bring you to Know what RELIGION is You that sometimes have said It is in vain to serve the Lord shall now be reduced unto better Sentiments you will soon believe that in Psal. 111. 10. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom Finally God will bring you to Know what all Sublunary things are You have had your too high Thoughts in your good Times then your Song was My Mountain is made strong God will now show you what Creatures are and give you cause to say of them They are all Physicians of no value and They are broken Cisterns that can hold no Water Well then say not All these things are against me It is a matchless Priviledge to be thus Taught of God. We are told in Eccl. 1. 18. He that increaseth Knowledge increaseth Sorrow Behold we may Invert the Words and not Injure the Truth Increase of Sorrow brings increase of Knowledge with it II Those things which you conclude to be against you are the things by which the most High designs to promote your VERTUE also The interest of Holiness will be marvellously befriended in your Souls and Lives by the influence of Affliction we are told in Heb. 12. 10. That God chastens us to make us partakers of his Holiness that Holiness which he does like and which is like to himself These Three will the Holy Effects of your Affliction be § Your Afflictions will First Help your Disorders Your Souls are depraved with or exposed to dangerous deadly Disorders and Distempers By Afflictions your Heavenly Father will Prevent them by Afflictions he will Redress them What are you Afflicted for See a short and a sweet account given of this Physick in Isa. 27. 9. By this the iniquity of Jacob shall be purged and all the Fruit shall be to take away his Sin. The first ways of David were his best ways Why so Truly it was because the first days of David were his worst days He doth himself assign this reason of it Psal. 119. 67. Before I was Afflicted I went astray but now I have kept thy word Usually men Sin least when they Suffer most God will have thy ways too to be good ways they shall therefore be ways Hedg'd with Thorns that thy Soul may not step awry Thy way must be incommoded by Thorns that it may not be over-run with Weeds There are great Sins which thy wild Lusts would hurry thee on unto there is a Madness in thy Heart that would produce all manner of Mischief in thy Life if restraint be not laid upon it now the Iron Chains of Affliction are clapt upon thee to keep thee from thy Exorbitancies What is said concerning the good Subjects of the Ancient Typical Antiochal Perfecution in Dan. 11. 35. is to be said concerning the good Subjects of any Affliction whatsoever They are Purged and made White thereby This more generally but more particularly I would add § Again Your Affictions will wean your Afflections from the wrong Objects of them God will have you to look upon all things here below with such Affections as David had for a Kingdom in an Exile and to say I am as a weaned Child To this end the Lord by Afflictions layes Wormwood
What I do thou knowest not now but thou shalt know hereafter Verily when we do hereafter know how God has at once Afflicted us and Amended us then we shall say He hath done all things well When we have got through the black Vallies out on the other side then we shall see what now we will hardly believe then we see that the Thoughts of God about us were Thoughts of Good and not of Evil then we see that the Aims of God were to do us Good in the latter end then do our Triumphing Souls declare as in Psal. 119. 71. It is good for me that I have been Afflicted Nothing is more common than to hear a Christian after many Afflictions professing I could not have been well without any one of all my Afflictions I had want of them all I have good by them all How much more will the Beauty and Benefit of all our Afflictions be thankfully acknowledged by us in the Land of light where every Labyrinth of providence will be explained for every one of our Afflictions in this we shall return a Million of Hallelujahs in another and a better World. The Improvement of these things remains VSE And now let these things incourage the people of the Saints of the most High unto a due Faith and Patience under the Afflictive Dispensations which their Heavenly Father tries them with Christians under all your Afflictions labour to say stedfastly to say joyfully not All these things are against me but rather Thanks be to God for his unspeakable Gifts The Language that best befits us under our Afflictions is that the frequent using of which gave unto a famous Jewish Rabbi the name of Rabbi Ganizoth namely This Affliction was for my good and This too and This too I am this day visited my self with the sudden Death of a dear and only Child Permit me to endeavour your Edification for you all have been and may be under some Affliction and most of you under such Affliction let me do it by tendering unto you such Considerations as I would this day quiet my own tempestuous Rebellious Heart withal As our Lord Jesus Christ himself was Tempted for this cause in part That he might know how to succour the Tempted thus the frail Men whom he employes for this among other that are worse causes are Afflicted even That they may more feelingly speak a word in season unto others in Affliction too ¶ There is First a General and then a Special Case which the following part of my Discourse must apply it self unto The General Case The more General Exhortation to be now Urged is Let us under no Affliction whatsoever be discomposed with any Apprehension as if it were utterly Against us I am speaking to many Children of Iacob that are Children of Affliction some of us are lamenting over our broken Estates like Naomi in Ruth 1. 21. saying I was Full but I am become Empty Some of us are Lamenting over our blasted Credits like David in Psal. 69. 20. saying Reproach hath broken my Heart and there are with us those who are Weeping over their Dead Children like the distressed Women of Bethlehom in Matth. 2. 18. Weeping for their Children and not willing to be comforted because they are not And many more such Griefs are the minds of devout Persons among us Wounded with That which Iacob sigh'd over his Ioseph and Simeon is by multitudes Mourned over their other Enjoyments also An Ezekiel as in Ezek. 24. 16. Sighs over the Desire of his Eyes She is not A Widow of one of the Sons of the Prophets as in 2 King 4. 1. Sighs My Husband is not An Isaac as in Gen. 24. 67. may Sigh over his Mother She is not An Israel as in Gen. 35. 29. may Sigh over his Father He is not And if a Ionah have had any Gourd which he has taken much contentment in he too as in Ion. 4. 8. is made to Sigh It is not But that which puts a Sting into all these Afflictions is that the Afflicted say All these things are against me Now O that there may be laid upon the thus talking Sorrow a charge of Silence Eternal Silence unto thee now O thou inordinate Passion before the Lord. Let this be as a Word upon the Wheels running into the very Souls of them that are of an heavy Heart Be entreated O Afflicted Christians to say no more All these things are against me No be Comforted be Refreshed with Sentiments that are quite contrary thereunto In your most cloudy hours O strive to say with him in Psal. 94. 19. In the multitude of my Thoughts within me O Lord thy comforts delight my Soul. COMFORTS It is the advice of the Wise Man in Eccl. 7. 14. In the day of Adversity consider Now there are these comfortable things which it is fit for you to consider in this day of your Adversity let me advise you with some Good and Comfortable Words Consider FIRST Those very things which your Affliction lies in the absence of might for ought you can say be very much unto your prejudice That very Ioseph that very Simeon that very Benjamin which you are Afflicted for the want of might do you more Hurt than Good. Even in outward Respects you canot determine what is best for you It were as much Arrogance in you to direct the Providence of God as it was Blasphemy in the well-known Prince to Correct the Creation of God when he said Had I been by at the Making of the World I could have shown how some things might have been better done Perhaps you are Afflicted because your Possessions about you are diminished but have you not read in Eccl. 5. 13. of Riches kept to the hurt of the Owners Many a Mans Cash has been his Crime his House has cost him his Head by his Land he has forfeited his Life the poor Heathen of old cursing of his Enemy wished that he might be a Rich man. Perhaps you are Afflicted because of a little Mud thrown upon your Reputations but have you not read in Prov. 27. 14. How pernicious a thing it is to have too much Applause in the World To be too well spoken of procures that Envy before which Who can stand The Breath in the Trumpet of Fame not rarely carries a Plague and a Bane to them whose Names it founds It may be your Affliction is the loss of Children well have you not read such a Message sent to a godly Man as that in 1 Sam. 2. 33. The Son of thine whom I shall not cut off shall be to consume thine Eyes and to grieve thine Heart T is possible that if thy Child had liv'd it might have made thee the Father of a Fool or that I may speak to the Sex that is most unable to bear this Trial the Mother of a Shame It is a very ordinary thing for one Living Child to occasion more trouble than seven Dead ones However in Spiritual Regards
you may be exceedingly harmed by the secular Delights which you desire you may have cause to Rue what you Wish because it may prove an Idol which will render your Souls like the Barren Heath in the Wilderness before the Lord. We do very Childishly often cry for a Knife that would cut the Fingers of our own Souls we pant after those things which may be to our Souls as bad as drink to the Thirsty craving Man in a Dropsie It was the very direful calamity of the ancient Israelites in Psal. 105. 15. The Lord gave them their Requests but sent leanness into their Soul. A Lean Soul a Wretched Soul a Soul pining away in its iniquities is oftentimes the effect of those fine things which we Dote upon It is a blasted banned Soul that sets up a Creature in the Room the Throne of the great God that gives unto a Creature those Loves and those Cares which are due unto the great God alone Such Idolatry the Soul is too frequently by Prosperity seduc'd unto We are told in Prov. 1. 32. The prosperity of Fools destroys them many a Fool is thus destroy'd O fearful case A full Table and a lean Soul A big Title and a lean Soul A numerous Posterity and a Soul e'n like the Kine in Pharaohs Dream Madness is in our Hearts if we tremble not at this Soul-calamities are sore Calamities Consider NEXT The benefit which the Lord intends you by your Afflictions is really very great and glorious The sweet Influences which your Afflictions are like to have upon you who can enough describe If you lose a Ioseph or a Simeon or a Benjamin behold these are Spiritual Blessings in Heavenly things with which God will abundantly make up your loss That very rule which the Lord has given us about the Nurture of our Children He observes in the Discipline of his own we are under our Heavenly Fathers executions of that Rule even then when the Death of our Children is the Affliction under which we labour Prov. 23. 14. Thou shalt beat thy Child with the Rod and shalt deliver his Soul from Hell. In this World you are like to be much the Wiser and much the Better for your Afflictions and much the more Blessed for them in the other World for evermore What And are these things against you God forbid you should imagine so I. Those things which you conclude to be against you are the things by which the most High designs to promote your KNOWLEDGE It is affirmed in Psal. 94. 12. That those Whom God chastens he also teaches out of his Law. The Almighty is now but putting of you to School and Schola Crucis est Schola Lucis you are in a School where the Lord will have you to learn many very notable and surprizing Lessons God will have Afflictions to be the Clay and Spittle that shall open those Eyes which Sin hath blinded horrible Cataracts have seized those Eyes which are by these means removed the Physician recites to you the names of some Bitter Herbs which the Eye-sight is relieved by We are indeed all of us a sort of Creatures which can see best in the Dark it was the Aphorism of Solomon the Wise in Prov. 29. 15. The Rod and Correction give Wisdom It usually comes to pass that Correction and Instruction go together You shall find that II 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Quae Nocent Docent that Maturant Aspera Mentem and that Vexatio dat Intellectum or as the Proverb of the Ancients hath it In Adversity Men find Eyes You shall now know more but hear of What § The Lord resolves to make you know more First of HIMSELF We have been miserably deficient in the knowledge of God we may say of our selves as Paul of some we may speak it unto our shame Our Ignorance of God hath been the cause of ours Sins Heu Prima haec scelerum causa est mortalibus aegris Naturam nescire Dei And our Knowledge of God will be the effect of our Sorrows for them The Lord is carrying of you into the Clifts of a cragged Rock and it is to make the Glory of his Attributes pass before you When Iob had gone through his weary Months he then said unto the Lord as in Iob. 42. 5. Now mine Eye sees thee It is by Affliction that we are brought to see the Soveraignty of God and to lie before him as Clay in the Hand of the Potter to see the Righteousness of God and to own that he punisheth us far less than our iniquities deserve to see the Holiness of God and to Reverence him as one that is of purer Eyes than to behold Evil to see the Power of God and to think that nothing is too hard for the Lord to see the Goodness of God and to find him a rewarder of them that diligently seek him in a word a little more Affliction will bring thee to say Lord I know thy Name and I will put my Trust in thee § The Lord resolves to make you know more Secondly of his SON What are all those Afflictions that make you groan Truly they are a few Chips and Splinters of a Redeemers Cross They are as 't is said in Col. 1. 24. That which is behind of the Afflictions of Christ some Vinegar and Gall was left by him for us to pledge him by tasting of God will thereby make you sensible a little of the Agonies and Anguishes that made him to Roar when there were Laid on him the Iniquities of us all We were never yet enough affected with the Kindness of our Lord Jesus in the dark doleful day when he endured the Cross despising the Shame which was due unto us all Art thou Poor God will have thee call to mind the Poverty which thy Redeemer underwent for thy sake the Poverty which when our Lord Inventoried his Estate rendred the Sum Total of it only this The Son of Man hath not where to lay his Head. Art thou Pained God will have thee mindful of the strong Pains which thy Redeemer felt when his Flesh was torn from his Bones when from Head to Foot bloody Wounds and Stripes and Stabs were to be seen upon him Art thou Fearful God will have thee bear in mind the horrible Consternation which caused thy Redeemer to Sweat clots of Blood tho' in a cold Night he were groveling on the cold Ground Art thou Disgraced God will have thee mindful of the Ignominy cast upon thy Saviour when he was used as a Traytor as all that was Vile and when the basest fellow in the City was counted a better Man than he Do thy Friends deal unworthily Thou shalt then learn what the Exercise of thy Redeemer was when even those of his own Family all forsook him and fled these things Affliction will make us Thoughtful of and Thankful for And as the Kindness of a Iesus so the Value of a Iesus comes to be